The present invention relates to a rotary internal combustion engine and especially to a simplified rotary internal combustion engine having sliding vanes controlled by a fixed shaft mounted in the engine rotor.
In the past, many types of engines have been suggested and utilized with the most common types being the standard reciprocating piston engines, radial piston engines, and various types of turbines. Rotary engines have also been commonly suggested to avoid the use of reciprocating parts to increase the efficiency of the engine by saving the energy wasted in converting reciprocal motion to rotary motion. Many of these rotary engines have been tested but have had little success in competing with the smaller reciprocating engines. Some of the prior art rotary engines have included a flap-type piston rotating inside a cylinder with either steam pressure or internal combustion causing the rotation of the pistons. It has also been suggested to mount a rotating piston eccentrically in relation to the main shaft and many complicated arrangements of levers and gears have been tried as have multiple rotating pistons In contrast to the more limited success of rotary combustion type engines, rotor compressors have proved quite successful in pumps, blowers, and the like and one of the most common types of compressors utilized for air conditioners uses a rotor or drum set in a housing with its axis eccentrically mounted on a rotating shaft and a radial blade sliding in a slot to produce a gas tight fit between the intake and exhaust of a compressor.
In recent years, a great deal of attention has been given to rotary combustion engines such as the Wankle engine in which a triangular piston with convex sides rotates on a shaft in a housing having an oval shape with the middle of the oval slightly constricted. The triangular piston in this type of engine has seals mounted on each of its corners which seals continuous ride on the walls of the oval housing.
In contrast to the prior art engines, the present engine is directed to a rotary internal combustion engine having simplified sliding vanes controlled by a fixed shaft mounted in the rotary engine rotor.
Prior rotary engines can be seen in U.S. Pat. No. 4,004,556 to Pfeiffer for a rotary internal combustion engine of the axially sliding vane type and in the Bernard, U.S. Pat. No. 3,150,646 for a rotary engine apparatus having sliding vanes sliding in and out of the rotating rotor. In the Takitani, U.S. Pat. No. 3,809,020, a sliding vane rotary engine and process for obtaining high torque power is provided with a large number of sliding vanes mounted in a rotor rotating in the engine housing. In the Bancroft U.S. Pat. No. 2,037,450, a rotary internal combustion engine has a rotor mounted in a housing with a plurality of cam controlled sliding vanes. Similarly, the Crutchfield, U.S. Pat. No. 4,241,173, has a rotary internal combustion engine with an eccentric control vane sliding in and out of the rotor housing. In the Femons, U.S. Pat. No. 1,217,733, a turbine explosive engine is provided with an engine housing having a rotor mounted therein which forms a chamber at each end by the elongation of the inside of the housing and includes a pair of large vanes, cam controlled along with compression chambers formed in the vanes for operation of the rotary engine. In the Peterson, U.S. Pat. No. 3,118,432, a rotary internal combustion engine has an engine housing with a rotating rotor therein and a plurality of pistons mounted in cylinders in the rotor which are cam controlled to plunge the piston in and out for assisting in controlling the operation of the engine. A prior rotary compressor can be seen in U.S. Pat. No. 114,558 which uses a control shaft to control the movement of a sliding vane for compressing air.
The present invention relates to a rotary internal combustion engine in which the fuel air charge is drawn in by an intake stroke with a rotating vane blade mounted in a rotor and is compressed by another vane blade pushing the gas in a chamber until all the fuel air charge is ignited by a spark plug to initiate the power stroke. An exhaust stroke follows the power stroke.